This year, Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT), a unit of Information Technology Services, began the Digital Commons at Penn State initiative to equip every campus location with a fully supported digital media production studio. This will provide all Penn State students, staff, and faculty, across all disciplines, with the means to create digital content to enrich coursework.
Video, audio, and multimedia can enhance students' learning experiences in many ways. Used in courses, digital media can help engage students in learning, illustrate complex concepts, inspire creativity, demonstrate mastery, and extend learning beyond the classroom.
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A student may be assigned to make a video of a role play with teammates, record a podcast on an aspect of culture in another country, compile a narrated video history of a technology, make a documentary, record a time-lapse movie of a construction site, or prepare video highlights from a field study.
Many students and instructors, however, lack the equipment or the expertise to produce and edit digital media. The Digital Commons will provide a solution to this challenge.
"I think there's a clear pedagogical need for integrating multimedia into teaching and learning, " said Chris Millet, manager of advanced learning projects in TLT and Digital Commons project manager. "As far as students generating content," he said, "it's a new way to get them excited about learning. It's fun to create audio and video. It's also a new way for them to express themselves."
Cole Camplese, director of Education Technology Services within TLT, said that after conducting student surveys, "what became very obvious is that our students are engaged in the creation of digital artifacts, not just for learning, but because they enjoy it. If you can find ways to bring elements of what they're interested in into your learning environment, you're going to have better transfer of knowledge and get to deeper-level learning because the students are going to be really active and engaged. So it's not about them watching a video necessarily. It's about them going through the process of creating, planning, and thinking critically. They can build something that they have ownership in, that they've applied energy to, and that they're proud of, then defend it in front of their classmates."
Camplese said, "I'm encouraging faculty to think about the kinds of activities they can ask their students to engage in around the creation of digital media and to understand the value of digital media as evidence of learning."
During summer 2007, studios were set up on five campuses: Brandywine (formerly Delaware County), Greater Allegheny, Harrisburg, Lehigh Valley, and Schuylkill. Currently in the works are facilities at Abington, Mont Alto, New Kensington, Shenango, and Wilkes-Barre. It is projected that by the end of the spring 2008 semester, studios will have been installed at twelve to fifteen campuses altogether. The remaining campus studios are scheduled to be in place by summer 2009. At University Park, the Faculty Multimedia Center and Studio 204, now both in Pollock Building, constitute the Digital Commons.
Each location will be supplied with the same types of professional-level production equipment and the same access to consultation and hands-on assistance.
The studios will offer a high-definition digital video camera, a still camera, tripods, a green screen, professional lighting, headphones, microphones, and VCR/DVD players. Each location will also include two large-screen iMac computers and a complete suite of software for editing multimedia files. TLT's Classroom and Lab Computing division will provide technical support and maintain the hardware. Secure, high-volume file storage will be provided at each location.
Two full-time TLT staff are dedicated to providing onsite training, project consultation, and assistance with using the equipment and software. When not visiting a particular campus, they continue to provide support by phone, chat, and screen-sharing software from their base at University Park.
Millet emphasized, "A very large part of the Digital Commons is the support we provide. A faculty member or student can come in with no knowledge about how to create digital audio or video and get whatever training they need before they start using the equipment," he said. Camplese added, "It's the people who will eventually become much more valuable to everyone in the Digital Commons than even the technology; the ability to help people think differently about the way they want to integrate digital media into teaching and learning."
The Digital Commons Web site at http://digitalcommons.psu.edu/ provides abundant support resources including tutorials, frequently asked questions, and helpful links. Visitors can stay up-to-date by reading posts on the site's blog. To add posts or comments, they must log in with their Penn State Access Account or Friends of Penn State account. Eventually, the site will also offer case studies and lesson plans related to digital media. "Faculty, students, and staff can come up with ideas or share examples, or if they have problems, they can voice those to the community," said Millet. "They can help each other out so that there's an additional layer of support."
Now that the first five studios are in use, Camplese said, "The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive." Tom Irwin, director of information technology in the Office of the Vice President for Commonwealth Campuses, said, "The campuses that are part of the initial Digital Commons studio pilot are reporting strong interest by both students and faculty. At Penn State Delaware County, the studio is in almost constant use by students who are developing digital media components for classes. At Penn State Harrisburg, the provision of the studio makes it possible to extend its current digital media capabilities beyond a few classes to the whole campus. The Greater Allegheny campus plans to make use of the studio in its integrative arts classes." Irwin added, "Students are enthusiastically exploring more advanced features and techniques to take their digital content to the next level of sophistication. I am confident that the combination of the ITS support team and local campus experts will enable students to reach this next level."